A meal Dar Williams would love, probably

Last night Jaime came over for a cooking session, since I’m learning and trying to live on this god-forsaken budget, and we made Sweet Chili Lime Tofu with Wok Steamed Collards and Quinoa:

It took us two hours, which overall was delightful since we both love Dar Williams and listened to her the entire time.  The last half-hour was tense, though, given how ravenous we’d become, and I started eating tortilla chips to keep from fainting. 

That’s not our end result pictured above, by the way.  I didn’t have exactly the right kind of pan, plus we steamed the collards in an electric steamer as opposed to a wok.  So ours was slightly less vibrant but still delicious.  I brought the leftovers to eat for lunch today and am pretty excited about it.

Something I learned last night, in addition to how to chiffonade mint, was that I share more qualities with my grandfather than I’d assumed before.  My grandfather has a somewhat manic tendency to begin cleaning up immediately after a meal, oftentimes before anyone else has even finished, which has many times resulted in us tugging our plates away from him.  Last night I caught myself washing plates, bowls, and pans while Jaime was still cooking, and I stopped to think of my grandfather and how sad I am that he’s got myelofibrosis and how I hope my mother’s doing all right with it and how much I love my mother and how much I love my father and then I teared up a little thinking about how impermanent this all is.

Thank god I could just blame it on the spices.  See?  I’m getting the hang of this cooking thing.